A no fuss, no watermarks random media archive of things associated with the UK.
Expect quite a few idents and TV related things as they are quite interesting to me along with other bits and bobs. If there's anything else you want to see, comment on a video and let me know - I'll try my best to find it.
I spent over 40 years with outside business telephone systems. We went from rooms as big as parlors to video recorder size equipment that handle 1000 times more telephones, than no phones at all just programs on computers. One thing for sure as telephone equipment progressed alot of jobs were lost.
Visited the Tower a number of times in 1966- as a young man in my 20's! Had a meal in the restaurant, and mailed a postcard there to my home in NZ. It has franked on it "Posted at the Post Office Tower, London" ..Sad times when the public access was stopped.. We were told this was due to the threat of possible terrorist action there. [a bomb etc:]
Nicely done...After watching the GPO Tower, I was thinking, wonder if there's any videos about WB and HANDEL...and what would you know! :-) Thanks so much! More!
My parents took me up there to the revolving restaurant when I was a child - totally AWESOME sitting there eating watching all of London. SUCH A WASTE that BT stopped people going up it and shut the restaurant! It would raise MILLIONS in tourist revenue! Considering how much debt BT now owe I would think they would open it up again!🤣😂
People laugh, but I can definitely see someone from today-times wanting to call their kid Lillicrap. I mean, why not? But if you don't buy that I'm sure I can sell you on the law firm Weaver, Clark and Lillicrap.
Only a few years ago AT&T abandoned the buried copper lines in my rear yard and installed fiber optic lines in the front, & into my living room. Never thought I would see a fiber optic line into my single family home. That is amazing. I think by 1970 only a few long distance calls still used an operator in the USA. Now, nearly all that mechanical equipment is history. I worked with a man who had been employed as a telephone operator. We were just starting off at a rather low paying government job. I asked him why he quit a job paying substantially more, and was surprised to hear him say that he couldn't take all the verbal abuse from customers. He said it gradually got to him, so he quit.
It was ours, it belonged to the British people, it is now being sold off to become a luxury hotel. Why is it not being turned into luxury apartments for the nurses, doctors, street cleaners that cannot afford to live in this part of London?
Funny how the sounds of the elecro-mechanical Strowger apparatus clattering away is dubbed into the film when only modern, silent electical/electronic equipment is in view. I suppose silence doesn't 'sound interesting'!
Great film, thanks for posting. Did the BBC’s Radiophonic Workshop do the soundtrack though? It wouldn’t have sounded out of place on an episode of Dr Who from the same era.
My father was the senior engineer at Centre Area, Post Office Telecoms, London and he took me up the tower when it was being built. We went up in a powerful hoist. The revolving restaurant hadn't yet been added. He also took me to Big Ben clock, House of Commons chamber, the hot line US Soviet comms to avoid nuclear war, the Post Office underground mail railway. I was aged around 11.
johncarden, you lucky chap, The PO infrastructure was supreme and certain systems your Dad would have been involved with were top class tech and hush hush.. Sadly we have neglected the fall back communication relying too much on digital systems and we have lost the local government control bunkers. Ahhh never mind we won't need them who is going to mess with our communications. ?. steer you to; RingwayManchester YT
Happy memories of commissioning STC TXK3 and TXK4 switches around Glasgow and Leeds in late 70s. Converted to TXE4 and then TXE4a early 80s then off to Saudi Arabia to commission PRX-A 205 and 5ESS-PRX #goodolddays
I worked for the GP0.There was a sponsored event for charity at the tower that I took part in.....a run from ground floor to the top.I managed a time of just over four minutes.I dont know what was worse,the fatigue or the dizziness from the spiral staircase.Ps, the tower is now going to be turned into a hotel.
My parents took me here around 1966. Too young to appreciate the importance of the place, but I definitely remember the view. (P.S. love the 'Forbidden Planet' sound effects).
It continues to boggle the mind how the Brits can be proud of so many things like being decades behind in their telecomminications network compared to the United States and many parts of Western Europe. Crying out loud, crowing about replacing a manual switch with a 1950s crossbar switch in greater London in bloody 1970??? For goodness sakes, U.S. cities were replacing crossbar switches with 1ESS switches by the mid-1960s and the only place you would see a manual exchange in 1970 U.S. was in a museum.
You could eat in a revolving restaurant even! Sadly, that came to an end when an (alleged) IRA bomb attack took place on 31st October 1971 & public access was finally closed in 1981...still, who wouldn't want to be exposed to microwave radiation whilst eating prawn cocktails?
When I worked in The Post Office PR Department I rescued a ton of booklets about the Post Office Tower from the skip. Fascinating stuff about its construction. My favourite section was about the uniforms of the various staff, including the kepi style hat with a badge on the front which was in the shape of the tower itself. Having looked at other videos about the tower, it seems the badge was never implemented and the usual GPO Crown was substituted… Happy days!
